Monterey for almost lunch

After a brief hiatus, this past Saturday my instructor and I embarked on the
next part of my flight training: cross-country flying. Up until now, everything
has been within 20-30nm (nautical miles) from
Hayward (KHWD). I originally planned a flight
up to Santa Rosa, but an airshow this weekend
caused me to look for alternative destinations.

Many members of the flight club will fly cross-countries to
Modesto or Sacramento
Executive, but both of those destinations are
eastward and bake with triple-digit temperatures most days, not my cup of tea.
I decided we would head southward to Monterey
(KMRY) and cool ocean breezes.

When calling for a weather briefing, I’ve always introduced myself as a student
pilot which nets friendly explanations on occasion. When asked my
destination, I responded “Monterey .. uhh, do want all my way points too?” The
briefer paused “oh yeah, that’ll be really important,” he then went on to
explain the process, why the FAA wants to know certain pieces of information,
helped me file my flight plan and then gave me a full standard weather
briefing.

9:30 in the morning and the lesson had already started.

My instructor arrived and we began to discuss the flight, reviewing my fuel
burn, planned speeds, altitudes and route of flight. While not perfect, I was
able to justify my decisions for my routing and calculations. After expressing
some concern about the weather, we reviewed the conditions in Monterey and
Salinas which lies to the east. While
Monterey wasn’t looking great, Salinas was, and we had 45 minutes of flying
ahead of us to let Monterey clear up.

With the binder for 738VU
in hand, we headed to the green ramp and started pre-flighting the airplane.

After a soft-field take-off from 28R, I turn right towards Mount Diablo and
climb to 1300ft until we’re clear of Oakland’s airspace. Passing by Lake
Chabot, I continue climbing to 3500ft, my first planned altitude. Time to open
our flight plan, I had the Oakland Flight Service Station queued up in the
comms, my thumb ready to depress the button

“Wait, uh, what do I say again?”

I feel confident in my current abilities to fly a plane, it’s not a brash “I’m
the shit” confidence, but more a “I can get myself up and down without
incident” confidence. My radio work has also been decent, but the radio work
for a cross-country through the bay area turned out to be one of the bigger
challenges to the trip. I’ve never opened a flight plan before, most times even
though Hayward Tower clears us to leave the frequency, we stick with them while
in the practice area.

After reciting and reviewing the exchange once or twice, I give it a go.

I stumble through opening my first flight plan, and then switch frequencies to
NorCal Approach.

General aviation was designed for smaller people, approaching the Calaveras
Reservoir crammed in this Cessna tincan, I have my kneeboard, folded chart,
flight plan and fuel calculations all sitting in a haphazard pile on my lap.
Struggling to keep the pile, and my long legs, out of the way of the yoke
proved to be a challenge. When our textbook discussed the notion of “Cockpit
Resource Management” I’m not sure they had “find a way to not fumble all over
yourself” in mind.

We mark the time as we cross over the reservoir, right on schedule.

The visual references I had chosen for the flight were all prominent enough to
where I had no problem picking them up from our meager altitude of 3500ft. We
continued southward past San Jose towards San Martin. Reaching South County
Airport, I turn right towards Monterey, and
climb to 4500ft, finally clear of San Francisco’s Class Bravo, and San Jose’s
Class Charlie airspace.

The air is noticably cooler as we close in on
Watsonville, the air vents get closed up and
we start our final turn and descent into Monterey. Due to clouds, I dog-leg
south along the coast, instead of taking the direct route over the bay. With
Monterey in sight, I’m reluctant to shed altitude with mountains so close
to the south and east of the field, clouds to the north and west.

I think I asked for permission to perform a forward slip to shed some altitude,
a clearly confident pilot-in-command moment. Either way, I start dropping like
a rock, at about 800 feet per minute towards a gigantic runway with two private
jets taxiing alongside. Still too damned high, I pick up my pace, rush through
my mental landing checklist, line up (hopefully) on the centerline, and throw
in full flaps.

Crossing the threshold too high and too fast, I’m not thrilled with the
approach but I’m determined to make it work (yellow flag). We settle onto the
runway with a jolt and exit the runway, my head hot from the stress. Neither of
us too pleased with the landing, I breath in slow and deep to calm down.

Without much time to eat or anything but take a leak, we decide to depart
immediately and head back to Hayward.

Sitting in the runup area, I call and close our flight plan from my cell phone
before contacting ground for my departure instructions. We taxi back the runway
in front of another jet and start our take-off roll, the lone prop plane among a
sea of lurking private jets.

Lurching into the air, I become anxious about the clouds straight-ahead. Well,
I’m anxious about the clouds straight-ahead and filling the entirety of the
right side windows. The right seat calls tower

“Monterey Tower, we’d like to do a left downwind departure to maintain VFR”

Tower grants us permission, I turn early, dodge a few clouds and then climb
above the layer of clouds over the bay to 3500ft.

Monterey behind us, blue skies ahead, I’m instructed to follow roads
instead of using the inverse of the headings I had calculated for the first
half of the flight. I spot Highway 101 over Prunedale, and follow it through
the hills and back into San Jose.

Similar to a return trip in a car, the flight back into Hayward seemed to go by
much quicker than the flight out.

Touching down on 28R with another jolt. I ended up rushing again, and didn’t
properly flare. Rolling to the end of the runway, I look at my watch “Got time
for a couple circuits?”

We take-off again, fly a couple circuits, with my landings improving back to
(rougly) where they should be, before calling it a day.

Cross-country flying is a big milestone, one I’ve been looking forward for a
while. Flying is fun, but flying to other places is something else. Considering
that we flew to Monterey in 48 minutes, a drive that would have taken over
twice as long, it’s safe to say that there are plenty of $100
hamburgers in my future